Welcome to 25 for 25 my project to watch and eat my way around the world in 2025 with 25 movies from 25 countries matched with 25 country themed dinners. Today’s entry is Thailand but you can see the full Masterlist to watch and cook along with me.
Country: Thailand
Movie: มนต์รักทรานซิสเตอร์ (Transistor Love Story)
Director: Pen-Ek Ratanaruang
Year: 2001
The Elevator Pitch: Phaen is a rural boy who loves to sing and preform, he isn’t exactly the brightest guy but gets by in life being charming and hard working. He falls in love with Sadaw, a local rural girl and they have a baby. Phaen is drafted shortly after but he abandons his post in the army just a few months in to attempt to win a singing contract and move to Bangkok. Hijink ensue.
It’s one part fable and one part reverse fairy tale.
How Was the Movie?: I did not enjoy this movie. I think if I were being the most charitable person possible I would say it’s not that terribly far off from something like “O Brother Where Art Thou” but the theme of Transistor Love Story movie really seemed to be that the city corrupts you and you should return to safe, simple rural life. Which I didn’t really appreciate. Also the main character is a Forest Gump type who goes through life so unflinchingly thoughtless that I found it very hard to have sympathy for him.
It’s shot beautifully but I was just at odds with the themes and characters in the movie. There’s plenty to appreciate here and I’m sure I was missing some cultural context but by the end of the movie I really just sided with Sadaw.
The movie tangentially touches on a lot of different social issues but never really says much about them. Easily the best part of the movie was the necklace chase sequence which got a lot of economy out of some smart editing and I also really enjoyed the “dinner party” that Phaen and his friend crash where rich people are pretending to be homeless (while Phaen is homeless and therefore people praise his costume). Most of the movie, like these sequences, never really becomes something truly interesting to me because it’s too quick to move on before the characters are actually confronted with something meaningful.
I do think that for me films where the main character is a moron can be difficult to watch but specifically in this film, whenever Phaen is presented with a choice, he basically decides to do the wrong thing for almost no reason every time.
Anyway Sadaw is right, men are dogs.
What was for Dinner?:
I made Thai red curry with chicken and we had coconut ice cream for dessert (from the store). I recently found out that in Thailand the green/red/yellow curries are sometimes called “stoplight curries.” I know there’s much more beyond the world of stoplight curries but I was too tired that day to do more than make a pretty easy meal. By the way I’m a Mae Ploy brand loyalist. I know everyone has their taste but that’s mine. Obviously it was delicious.
That’s it for Thailand, see you next in Egypt!